The Ukrainian Ministry of Infrastructure has asked the French railway industry for assistance in implementing a project for establishment of a system for changing railway track gauge.
This was announced after a meeting of the Ukrainian-French working group on transportation, which was held on May 19, the CFTS reports.
According to the Ukrainian Ministry of Infrastructure, Ukraine expressed interest in the experience of France railway experts in "further development of the Ukrainian railway infrastructure and construction of new rolling stock, including the use of a system for changing the track gauge for rolling stock. The French side said it would consider the possibility of expert consultative assistance and that it would help obtain funds from the European Union for technical assistance in implementation of a project involving a system for changing the track gauge in Ukraine."
Representatives of the Ukrainian Ministry of Infrastructure, headed by Deputy Minister of Infrastructure Viktor Dovhan, provided information about the work that the ministry and the Ukrainian Railways public joint-stock company (Ukrzaliznytsia) have done to develop multimodal transportation in the Europe-Asia direction, using Ukraine’s transport infrastructure, particularly within the framework of the existing transport corridors defined by the TEN-T network.
In addition, Ukraine invited France to participate in implementation of investment projects in Ukraine.
As the CFTS portal reported, the PKP Intercity railway company (Poland) intends to modernize railcars equipped with the SUW-2000 variable-gauge system and use them on trains to Eastern European countries, including Ukraine. The modernization will be performed by Remtrak, a subsidiary of PKP Intercity that specializes in repair of passenger railcars.
As the CFTS portal reported, Ukrzaliznytsia has temporarily abandoned the use of railcars equipped with the SUW-2000 system on the Lviv-Wroclaw route. As a result, the travel time has increased by 1.5 hours.
